


Three's A Crowd

by Lliaq



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Angst, Drug Use, Gen, I did like two google searches, Medical Inaccuracies, Temporary Character Death, but also humor, but idk when, idk this is a mess and a half, just pretend it exists in a vacuum somewhere, just take my burnt pancakes, like I said: a mess, set sometime before the show, unneccessary timestamps
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-24
Updated: 2019-03-24
Packaged: 2019-11-29 02:22:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18216911
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lliaq/pseuds/Lliaq
Summary: Family reunions sure are fun. Especially when two thirds of the attendees are dead.Or: The one where Diego dies (but only for like 30 minutes), Klaus cries (a lot), Ben unknowingly solves a murder, and Eudora Patch just wants to go to bed





	Three's A Crowd

**Author's Note:**

> My brain couldn't decide if it wanted something angsty or funny, so I'm sorry if this feels like it's flip-flopping all over the place  
> It's a mess  
> Not beta'd

**01:04**

Klaus is floating in a wonderful drug-induced haze, and has been for some time now. He's not sure how long exactly, and it doesn't really matter. It's really great and he feels great and everything would be _perfect_ , if Ben would just shut up.

"Klaus!"

There it is again, for the third time in less than a minute, and Klaus finally decides that enough is enough.

"What's up?" he sighs, opening his eyes and seeking out Ben.  
But Ben isn't looking at him. No, he's looking at something behind Klaus and that just makes no sense because there's no one else here.  
No ghosts either. No, he's way too high for that, he made sure of it.

Whatever it is, it can't be that important.

Klaus rolls over, squishing his face into the soft fabric of the couch. He's never met a couch that smelled this nice before. He sniffs discreetly. Mh ... flowery. Nice.

"Klaus." Ben says again, and there's a sense of urgency in this voice that, try as he might, he can't ignore.

Klaus sits up slowly, stretching and yawning. Something in his back pops and the sound is gross but god does it feel good.  
He lets out a satisfied groan and almost lies right back down, before remembering why he sat up in the first place.  
"You have my attention." he says to Ben, who just gives him a wide-eyed look and jerks his head in Klaus' direction. Or rather, towards whatever's behind him.  
Right, yes.

Klaus is too lazy to actually move, so he settles for awkwardly twisting his upper body until he can see what's causing Ben to make such a fuss.

It's just Diego.

Really, he woke up for this?

"Hey."  
He waves at Diego and flops back down.  
"How long you been there? I didn't hear you come in." he says to the ceiling, while he blindly fumbles for the joint he was smoking earlier.  
He could've sworn it was on the table. Maybe in his jacket? Wait, did he finish it? Urgh, he can't remember.  
"For fuck's sake, Klaus." Ben mutters. "Pull yourself together. _Look at him_."

Actually, what _is_ Diego doing here? How would he even-

Klaus sits up so fast the whole room goes spinning and it takes a solid thirty seconds for everything to settle down.  
When it finally does, he's left with the sight of his brother, wearing his ridiculous vigilante getup. He's also drenched head to toe and there's a lot of blood on his stomach, and Klaus might be high, but he's not stupid.

"No." Klaus says, very decisively, and pulls the blanket over his head, like the mature adult that he is.

* * *

**01:07**

Hiding doesn't really work, because he can still hear Diego and Ben talk and it makes it entirely impossible to ignore the fact that he lost another brother.  
Fuck, he can't do this. Not again.

"Klaus, come on. We know you can hear us." Ben says, way louder than before.  
Klaus pulls the blanket from his head and jumps.  
Ben is right next to him, and Diego's on his other side.  
  
The couch is starting to feel a bit crowded.

There's an upside to the whole situation though - he spots his joint on the armrest. Thank god for small mercies.  
He reaches out without thinking and his arm phases right through Diego's chest.  
Diego looks down and makes a face.  
Klaus pauses, arm still through his brother.  
"Ah, uhm..sorry?" he offers, smiling apologetically.  
But he's committed now, and he only has to stretch a little further to get his hands on the prize.

The half-burned joint clutched tightly in between his fingers, he pulls his arm back, watching with almost morbid fascination as Diego's chest ripples blue-ishly before returning to normal.  
It's not like he hasn't done this about a billion times with Ben, but this is Diego.  
Diego's not supposed to be dead.  
It's different, somehow.

His hands shake so badly, it takes him five tries to light the joint, and the entire time he's trying, he can feel Ben and Diego's disapproving looks.

"Great, now there's two of you."

* * *

**01:10**

After two long drags, that he savors every second of, he finally feels ready to face the elephant in the room.  
"So, you're dead." he says, just in case Diego didn't know, and because he doesn't really know _what_ to say.  
  
Letting his head fall onto the backrest, he stares at the ceiling and unsuccessfully tries to make smoke rings.  
He didn't know what to say to Ben when he died, and he doesn't know now either. What do you say to the ghost of your freshly deceased brother?  
This _is_ a recent development, right?

"How long- you know-" He gestures vaguely at Diego, lolling his head to the side so he can actually look at him.  
It would be incredibly awkward if Diego died years ago and he just now found out. Then again, it's not like their family is close - like, at all.  
He can't even remember the last time he talked to any of his siblings - aside from Ben, obviously.

Diego looks around the room until his eyes settle on the clock on the wall.  
He seems to be taking the whole dying and becoming a ghost thing rather well. Better than most people, really.

"Ten minutes, give or take."  
That's _very_ recent, jeez.  
"Oh ..., my condolences." Klaus says, taking another drag from his joint.  
"That's all you have to say?"  
Klaus turns his head, shooting Ben a _what can you do_ look and lifting his shoulders in a half-hearted shrug.  
"What do you want me to say?"  
"I don't know." Ben says incredulously. "You could at least pretend to care."  
"Guys-" Diego tries, but is immediately drowned out by Klaus' laughter. And if it's a touch on the hysterical side- well the only people who know are already dead. Who are they gonna tell?

He looks back and forth between Ben - annoyed, somewhat disappointed -, and Diego - clearly confused - and laughs until somewhere along the line it turns into crying.  
How embarrassing.  
But once the waterworks start they're really hard to stop.  
"Shit, Klaus-"  
"Oh no-"

He waves his hands and ash goes flying everywhere but who the fuck cares. His life is a fucking shitshow anyways.

"No, no, it's fine. I'm fine." he says, and it might be a little more convincing if he wasn't a sobbing mess with snot running out of his nose and ash in his hair.

He cries for what feels like ages, while Ben and Diego watch, helplessly.  
Their words, while meant to be comforting, only make it worse.  
Because they're _dead_ , they're fucking dead and now there's two of them and he's well and truly fucked.

* * *

**01:15**

"What a fun little family reunion." he hiccups, once the worst of it is over, giving them both a watery smile.  
He sniffs and wipes a hand over his face, taking a deep breath.  
Alright, he can do this. He's done it before.  
  
"So, Diego, pray tell. How'd you get yourself killed?" he asks as he's grabbing the lighter to relight his joint. It's barely more than a stump, but he needs all the help he can get.  
Diego tugs at the hole in his sweater. There's blood underneath and all around it and the edges are all frayed and singed.  
"Pretty sure I got shot."  
"Ouch." Ben comments quietly.  
"That sucks." Klaus adds.  
"Yeah."

And that's that.

* * *

**01:18**

Klaus always figured that Diego was the most likely to meet a violent end, what with the whole vigilante shtick and all, but it was one of those abstract, far off in the future things that you don't _really_ think about until they happen.  
But it happened, and now he's sitting on a couch in some apartment that he's been crashing in since that party two weeks ago, sandwiched in between his two dead brothers.  
Yay.

Ben and Diego are talking quietly and Klaus kind of zoned out, but he's brought back to reality when Diego addresses him directly.  
"Klaus, there's ... there's someone I need to talk to, but.."  
But he's dead.

Oh, he so does not want to do this.

"And you want me to deliver a message?" Klaus asks tiredly, throwing the joint stub into the ashtray on the table.  
Or tries to, anyways. It goes sailing over the table and lands on the floor somewhere.  
Close enough.

"I- yeah." Diego looks uncomfortable and for some reason that makes Klaus feel better. Is that messed up? Probably.  
But at least he's not the only one who's struggling with this mess.  
  
"Alright, shoot. Who, where, what?"  
He spots a sharpie on the table and grabs it, taking the cap off and holding it over his arm, ready to take notes.  
He's self-aware enough to know that he definitely will not remember everything. And too lazy to look for a piece of paper.  
Sometimes it just be like that.

"She- uh, look for Patch. Off- Detective Patch."  
Klaus nods, carefully writing out the letters on his arm.  
**P A T C H**  
"She works at the 108th precinct."  
Detective, precinct- A bit delayed, but the words finally register in Klaus's head. He stops writing and looks up.  
"Your girlfriend is a _cop_?" he wheezes. Christ, that's the best thing he's heard all day. Mr. Vigilante is dating an honest to god officer of the law.  
"That's _hilarious_."  
"Come on, Klaus." Ben butts in, but even he sounds amused.  
"She's not my girlfriend."  
Klaus narrows his eyes at Diego. He smells bullshit, and decides to say as much.  
"Bullshit."  
"Wh-"  
"You wouldn't ask me to talk to her if she wasn't important."  
Diego snaps his mouth shut with a pained expression.  
  
Oops.  
  
"Sorry." Klaus sighs, looking down at his arm.  
**1 0**  
"108th, right?"  
After Diego confirms, he finishes the number, feeling like a piece of shit.  
It's easy with Ben, because he's used to Ben, and Ben is used to being dead. But Diego isn't, as is evident from the look on his face.

"Alright, what's the message?" he asks, cutting through the tense silence.  
Family reunions sure are fun. Especially when two thirds of the attendees are dead.

When Diego doesn't answer after a minute, he looks up again.  
"Earth to Diego?"  
Diego shakes his head a little and frowns.  
"I just- I don't know-"  
Ah.

* * *

**01:23**

"Look, you care about her, right?" Klaus asks, absently doodling smiley faces inside the Os on his left hand.  
Diego hesitates and nods.  
"Okay, well if she were here right now, what would you say to her?"  
"I..." Diego trails off, looking lost.

Alright, new tactic.

"Okay, okay, it's fine. How about this? Ben, pretend to be Diego's lady cop."

"What? No!"  
" _No_."

They both protest at the same time and Klaus yearns for something stronger than weed. But there's only a bottle of rum on the floor, and it's almost empty.  
It'll have to do.

"That would be weird." Ben says.  
"Yeah, yeah it would. Please don't do that." Diego agrees.

"Well, you got any better ideas?" Klaus snaps, regretting it instantly when another tense silence descends over the room.

* * *

**01:25**

The sound of the bottle cap scraping against the glass as he unscrews it is obnoxiously loud in the absence of any other noises.  
He didn't mean to snap.  
This is just ... a lot. He didn't sign up for this.

"Tell her where to find my ... body." Diego says suddenly and Klaus chokes on his rum.  
"You're telling me your corpse is just out there somewhere, rotting?" he manages to wheeze out in between coughing and spluttering.  
Shit, his throat is burning and his eyes are watering and _how_ does this keep getting worse? Who did he piss off, God?  
"It's been less than an hour, I don't think it would be rotting yet." Ben adds.  
"Not helping, Ben." Klaus sighs.  
Diego gives them both an odd look.  
"I don't know. Maybe? They dumped it ... me? They dumped me in the river. I don't know what happened after that."

Klaus makes a pained noise. They dumped him in the river.  
_In the river_.  
That's just fantastic.  
He feels that hysteric laugh bubbling up again and eyes the remaining rum critically.  
He's going to need a lot more than that.

"And you didn't think to mention this sooner?" Ben asks, always the more level-headed one.  
Diego shrugs.  
"Didn't really think about it until now."  
Klaus fights the urge to facepalm and picks up the sharpie again.  
"Alright, where can we find your body?"  
  
And fucking hell, that's not a question he's ever wanted to ask. Anyone, but definitely not one of his siblings.  
This is just a whole new level of messed up.

Diego gives him the address to a motel by the river, some dump on the outskirts of town, and then falls silent.  
It's unlikely that his body is still there, if it was actually dumped in the river, and they're probably all thinking it - but no one wants to be the one to say it out loud.  
This is all depressing enough as it is.

Klaus looks to Ben for help, but Ben doesn't look like he has any idea what to do either.  
Great. Absolutely fantastic.

But maybe Diego doesn't need any help after all.  
"Tell her- t-tell her that I'm sorry-" he says, speaking slowly, the way he would when he was young and fighting for every word.  
He also looks like he'd be crying, if ghosts _could_ cry, and seeing his usually stoic brother like that just doesn't sit right with Klaus.  
Granted, the whole dead part doesn't sit right with him either, but there's not a whole lot he can do about that.

"And that she was right." Diego adds, shaking his head and snorting, somewhat alleviating the somber mood. Thank fuck.  
"Can't believe I'm saying this, but she was right."  
Klaus cocks his head to the side and raises his eyebrows.  
"About what?"  
It's not every day that he hears Diego admit to being in the wrong. And look, all it took was him dying.  
Just...great. This is all great. Maybe if he keeps telling himself that, it'll come true.  
Law of attraction, or something like that.  
He doesn't actually know how that shit works, just heard about it from someone somewhere sometime.

Diego gives him a humorless smile.  
"She said I was a stubborn idiot and I was going to get myself killed."  
Oh. Well.  
"Smart lady."

Next to him, Ben sighs and mutters "This family is a mess."  
He's not wrong.

* * *

**01:28**

"Okay, I'll tell her that you're sorry, and that she was right about you being a stubborn idiot." Klaus repeats, looking at the smudged writing on his arm.  
He's running out of room. He'll just have to remember the rest.  
"Anything else?"

Diego looks torn for a moment, but then he nods.  
"Yeah, tell her th-" He stops abruptly and blinks dazedly, his eyes losing focus.  
Klaus exchanges a look with Ben.  
"You okay there, buddy?"  
"I-" Diego's eyes find his, wide and scared, and then he's just gone. Poof.

"What the fuck."  
"What the hell."

 

* * *

 

**02:53**

Klaus enters the 108th precinct and immediately feels all eyes turn to him.  
Granted, it's the middle of the night and there's probably not a lot going on, but it's kind of creeping him out.  
Well, better get on with it.  
"Hello? I'm looking for Detective Patch."

* * *

**03:01**

Unsurprisingly, Detective Patch is not at the precinct at three fucking o'clock in the morning.  
"I told you to wait until morning." Ben says.  
"Oh shut up." Klaus mutters back, earning himself a raised eyebrow from the officer that's watching him.

At least he got to sit down, which was a relief after making the trek to the station by foot.

After a lot of half-truths and some arguing, he was instructed to sit down and wait while someone called Patch.  
He kind of feels bad for her, getting dragged out of bed at this ungodly hour, just for someone to tell her that her not-boyfriend is dead, but sometimes life is just shitty like that.  
Ben's been sneaking - well, not really sneaking. More like just casually walking - around the precinct, snooping.  
Klaus dozes off under Ben's ongoing commentary on a murder that happened in a bodega somewhere. He thinks the owner's son did it.  
Klaus honestly couldn't care less.

* * *

**03:36**

Someone's shaking his shoulder and it's _annoying_.  
"Mhmm?" He cracks one eye open and sees it's a lady that looks like she just rolled out of bed. Bad case of bed-hair and bloodshot eyes. Not that he's in any position to judge. He probably looks ten times worse.  
There's also a badge hanging around her neck. Must be Diego's not-girlfriend.  
"Patch? Detective Patch?" he asks.  
"Yes, that's me." She sounds tired and a tiny bit annoyed and honestly, he can't blame her.  
"They told me you were looking for me specifically?"  
Klaus nods, feeling a bit more awake now. Ben catches his eye, from where he's perched on the corner of a desk, and smiles in sympathy.  
Yeah, now comes the fun part.

He takes a deep breath - and then lets it out without coming up with anything to say.  
Patch looks at him expectantly. Ah, shit.  
"Okay, there's no easy way to say this, so-" he blows out another breath, "Diego's dead."  
There, he said it. Easy.  
Except for the part where saying the words out loud made him feel like someone just punched him in the gut.  
Diego's _dead_.

It hits him all over again, or maybe for the first time. He's a bit more sober now, and jesus fucking christ, it _hurts_.  
Diego's not-girlfriend on the other hands seems remarkably unaffected. Maybe it was a one-sided thing. Huh.  
He never took Diego for the pining type.  
  
"He- what are you talking about? He's not dead." she says. If anything, she just sounds confused.  
Behind her, Ben grimaces. Denial.

Klaus sighs, wipes at his face - god he's crying a lot tonight, isn't he - and musters up a smile that ends up being more of a grimace.  
"My dear brother got himself shot."  
Patch looks at him like he's crazy. To be fair, he probably is. He definitely looks the part.

"Yeah, I know about that. But he's not dead." she says and Klaus feels like he's about to start crying, _again_.  
"He's not?"  
It's kind of pathetic, the way his voice cracks, but he's beyond caring at this point.  
Patch's expression morphs into something more sympathetic.  
"No, I just saw him. I came straight from the hospital."

"Oh." he says, because his brain is just straight up refusing to work.  
Diego's dead, and then he's alive, and he really just needs a fucking minute to process.  
Did he even really see Diego, or did his brain cook up some fucked up hallucination? But Ben saw him too, didn't he?  
Wow, he's too tired for this.

"It was a close call." Patch sighs. "But getting thrown into the river actually saved his life."  
"What now?" Klaus squints at her. Were the lights this bright the whole time? There's a headache starting to form behind his eyes and he really wants to lie down. On a bed, preferably.  
She nods and sits down at the desk across from him.  
"Apparently his heart stopped beating for- a while. But the water kept his body temperature low enough that his brain cells didn't die as fast as they normally would. He's lucky to be alive. And not brain-dead."  
All of a sudden, she looks about as frazzled as Klaus feels. Most of what she just said went straight over his head - it's really hard to pay attention when there's like thirty people talking at once.  
He forgot how many ghosts police stations tend to attract.  
But he got the gist. Diego died, sort of, for a while.  
That explains the ghost. He just didn't die all the way.  
"Lucky bastard." he mutters.  
Patch gives him a weird look, but then she huffs out something akin to a laugh.  
"Yeah, he really is."

* * *

**04:04**

It hits him as he's leaving the precinct, after weaseling his way out of having to explain just how he knew that Diego had been shot.  
Diego's alive and he went through this hell of an emotional rollercoaster for no fucking reason.  
Abruptly, he switches directions.  
"Where are you going?" Ben asks, trailing behind him.  
"I'm going to kill him."

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading  
> You can find me on [Tumblr](https://lliaq.tumblr.com)


End file.
